Drum Major Katherine
by LeifErikson
Summary: It's Katherine's last summer at band camp, and she's looking for something meaningful to remember it by. However, being "Drum Major Katherine" is getting in the way ...
1. Getting Stranded

I stood in front of the dorms, waiting for the buses to make their first appearances with the newest anxious freshman and familiar unenthusiastic upperclassmen. My mind started to wander as my eyes roamed the terrain. I could remember every year of camp that I had attended previously, though nothing really seemed to matter.

Sure, this was a place for music. We got our charts down, we memorized our music, or, in my case, got used to keeping my arms up and changing time signatures, and returned to Forest Hills as better musicians. However, there was another aspect to this too – fun. But, looking around, I could see no "fun" memories, only the ghost site of an endless rehearsal or wicked sunburn. That was going to change this year.

Ever since I had been a drum major my sophomore year, I had been a good role model. I devoted my time to knowing my music faster than the other, older drum majors, had always kept good time during the shows, never talked or moved at attention, and now was the example for the two juniors that we had as drum majors now. This meant that there was no time for screwing around, and all work and no play had come easily to me. I was a contented band geek with no other love than music, and music was what I lived for. This still being true, I was starting to wonder about how different it would be if I didn't have these responsibilities. Something about arriving her for my last year made me wonder, and I was feeling discontent. Still wary of the consequences, I realized that this year I _had_ to make fun happen.

I could hear the rubber squeaking on the pavement as the first bust skidded to a stop from a crazily high speed, and it pulled me away from my thoughts. The second bus closely followed at a slightly safer speed and, immediately, I became Drum Major Katherine.

With an incredibly slow speed, each student climbed of the bus, weighed down by their luggage. The lag was terrible, and I was getting uneasy. All I had to do was show them where their dorms were, and then they would, once their things were put away, be herded off to listen to a session on the camp's rules. I stared impatiently as a blonde boy took his time as the last one to board off the second bus. Once he was finally out, the drivers sped off and I smiled slightly to myself, knowing that all of these kids were now stranded here.

Once I could feel Tammy and Alexa, our two junior drum majors, at either side of me, I started my instruction. I simply stated that boys were to stay at the building on my right, and that girls were on the left. Within seconds, about one hundred teenagers were chattering and flooding around me. I waited until I heard the last of them shuffle in and Tammy and Alexa to leave before I wiped my hair out of my face and sighed.

I could have skipped the intro meeting if I wanted, even though it was mandatory. The directors always assumed that I knew everything and that I was off doing something productive. I had never taken advantage of this, but I still found it odd. I realized that Ms. Trepe must have seen that I had no fun and no life (putting a euphemism on it, we could call it "devotion"), and Mr. Auer just complacently agreed with her. It almost bothered me that The New Guy, Mr. I-Have-Nothing-to-do-but-Join-Winter-Guard-or-Drum-Core-or-March-Trombone-and-then-Brag-About-it-Even-Though-no-One-Cares thought that _I_ had no life. Sitting on a worn wood bench waiting for the camp director to start his speel about rules, I considered this.

When everyone was there and all the freshman were listening intently and all the upperclassmen had nearly dozed off, I looked around, trying to familiarize myself with the names on the attendance sheet and the faces of the band kids.

Jean Bennett was one of the first freshman I saw. She had light, nearly colorless brown hair and eyes that seemed to be somewhere else, even more so now. I had heard that she was a very talented clarinet, but I wondered if she would be able to pay attention on the field.

Then I looked over the names of Alica Conner, Ben Grey, Amanda Nickleson, Josh Ford, and Jennifer Williams. I met each one's faces respective to their names' places on the roster and assessed what kind of a marcher each one would be. I would have looked over more, but my eyes went to the list of the tenor saxophones and looked up, to find their newest freshman, Jake Cullen.

Jake Cullen had been the blonde from earlier. He didn't exactly make a good first impression on me, considering that he wasted my time, but now ... Now he was sitting, calmly up in the in the nearest tree, without anyone else even noticing! I was so flustered that, if it would have been acceptable to yell at him right now, I wouldn't even have been able to talk. I blinked for a few moments until I realized that now he was looking at me. I glared at him for a moment before a careless smile slipped across his expression. I could feel my mouth drop open and he laughed silently. I quickly tore my face away and started to plot all sorts of punishments.

My eyes stared at the camp director, my brain trying to be distracted. But, despite my attempts to find a distraction, threats filled my head. Boy, that kid was gonna get it.

It was all over, and all the kids were clearing out, so I had to push against them to get to the tree. However, I didn't have to do this for long, because the boy jumped to the ground, smoothly landing, and walked right up to me. I thought he was mad, walking to his death like this, but I mentally commended him for not running off. When he was in earshot of me, the group had shuffled off to their dorms, and I opened my mouth to speak.

"What do you think you were--" I turned around stunned. The boy had walked right past me. "Get back here right now! Turn around right now, or I'll ... I'll," I was having a brain jam and needed a second. I felt like an idiot – I was usually really good with this and had a little more control over myself, but this kid just made me so angry.

He walked back over to me. Standing, what I thought, was just a little too close to me, he looked up and said quietly, "Or you'll do what?" The words had a certain sting to them, but he smiled after saying them, and I was perplexed by this paradox.

He obviously saw this because his green eyes seemed humored before he turned his back to me once again to leave. I was utterly frustrated with myself and the boy, but quickly reminded myself that I needed to get on the field. My dark brown hair was already starting to mat itself to my head, and I knew it was going to be a long day.


	2. Arrogance: The Best Feature in a Man

I later collapsed in my bed, thinking about the day. I had trouble with freshman all day, like on every first day, but thankfully I had Tammy and Alexa to handle most of them. I had not done anything fun yet, and my resolution was still nagging at me when I pulled the covers over my head. I saw some sophomores go out into the woods to smoke and was tempted to join, even though I never thought of smoking as anything great. I thought, thought, that it would be daring and risky but, just as I decided to do it, Mr. Auer pulled me aside to see if I knew how many kids there were in the band. Calmly replying "one hundred thirteen" I slipped off to my bed, where I now lay for the second hour, trying to, by falling asleep, push the day out of my head.

Nearly drifting off, I started to treat the girls' voices next to me as a soft metronome. I was just about to slip away into sleep, when I heard one voice quickly gushing something about Jake Cullen. My eyes slowly opened just enough to read the girls' expressions. It was past curfew, and only a small, dim light remained on. I listened to them now, more carefully.

"Have you _seen_ him?" asked one voice.

"I know, he's absolutely stunning!" exclaimed another in a whisper.

_I didn't think he was that great._

"Do you think he would dance with me on the last night? You know, at the band camp dance Friday?" asked the third girl.

_He might, if he survives that long._

"He's so sweet," said the second girl.

_Right. If you like arrogance._

"Don't get your hopes up too far," said the first girl.

"Why not?" the other two asked in unison.

"Well, have you seen the way he looks at Katherine?" the first girl asked, with emphasis on the word "seen."

"Go to sleep, girls," I said without opening my eyes. "It's past curfew."

Smiling now that I knew I had scared them, I listened as all three of them immediately stopped talking and frantically got to their beds.

But, even with them gone, all I heard was their words the rest of the night.


	3. The Epiphany

The next few days I couldn't think correctly. I mindlessly walked through my daily routine, strict as ever, and everything went by in a comfortably hazy blur. However, Friday morning I went into panic mode. Oh my God, it was the last day! The last day of band camp for the rest of my entire life, and already the week had slipped through like sand – no, not even sad, water – water in a sieve. It had all rushed through before I knew it was even there, and now I was staring at the flushed remains of my nonexistent teenage social life.

I walked into breakfast, and, like always, I was one of the first few to arrive. I could hear the percussion still practicing outside, like they did every morning while the color guard girls obnoxiously woke everyone up. This familiar pattern scared me, and I looked up, head lowered defensively to see if anyone was there. To my surprise, there actually _was_ someone there, and they were only one seat away from me.

Obviously, my surpriser saw the look on my face and knew immediately what it was because, before I could say anything, he said the most offensive, narcissistic thing I had ever heard. "I know, sometimes I'm surprised at how incredibly good-looking I am too, but please, do your best to not let your mouth hang open like that. It's not very lady-like."

"And I thought I had gotten rid of you this week," I said, starting to get up and walk away (in other words, flee). I would have punched him in the face the first time, had it not been for my responsibilities as a drum major, and even with those, hitting him still seemed justified.

"Hey," he grabbed my arm. I think he was going to say more, but this time I _did_ hit him. I scanned the cafeteria as he pretended that his arm hurt, mocking me; thankfully, no one had seen me do the deed.

"I think I should go," I said, my voice shaking more than I meant it to.

"I think you should stay," he said simply, looking into my eyes mercilessly.

I felt odd for a second – an ineffable type of odd that you later realize was something common to you that you had been denying to yourself. "Listen, I'm not going to waste any more of my time talking to you. You haven't exactly made the best impressions on me, and I don't exactly wish to talk to you. In fact, I believe the only circumstance in which I would engage you, is on the field, and we wouldn't want that to happen, now would we? If I talk you then, I'll have to be Drum Major Katherine."

"Don't kid yourself: you are _always_ Drum Major Katherine." He looked at me defiantly for one long moment and walked away.

He quickly slipped into the crowd; by now everyone was here, in the cafeteria, being dismissed by sections to get their breakfast. I slipped down into my seat and then realized I wasn't hungry. What had I been doing, coming here so early? I couldn't remember. Why was there no one sitting next to me? There hadn't been the whole week. I had never noticed ...

... probably because I was too busy being Drum Major Katherine.

After breakfast, the first few hours on the field went well. The heat started to rush in, unforgiving and purposeful around eleven thirty. I didn't eat lunch or even go inside when everyone was called in. I sat down, legs folded, on my scaffolding, looking up at the sun, indirectly. I wondered about the more social aspects of life, and, for once, put music behind me. That wasn't what today was going to be for. I was only broken from my haze when I heard the chatter of teenagers, giddy and tired and somehow still enthusiastic. Everything was going uneventfully as I counted down the hours until the band camp dance, waiting for tonight's fateful dusk.

I let myself lay on the scaffolding, and I quickly closed my eyes, imagining what I could possibly do to make my last day of band camp something memorable. I thought for a moment about the typical options of a teen in my position. However, none of these things seemed very reasonable. Smoking didn't seem that glamorous anymore. Vandalism was out of the question; my title prohibited that. I could not pull a prank that no one would ever forget because I was not imaginative enough, and also had brought nothing with me but my clothes. I could feel something, in the back of my mind, approaching, like it was right in front of my face ...

I opened my eyes. I almost let out a kind of surprised squeak, but caught myself. The upside-down face of Jake Cullen bombarded my sight. A couple of angry, alarmed blinks later, I realized that I was just a little dazed. Tammy was actually the one standing over me, and she was telling me that we were up again and reminding me that there was a mere seven hours left until the work was over – until the dance.

To my pleasant surprise, those eight hours couldn't have passed by more quickly.

Slipping on some new, clean clothes, I thought about how our performance for the parents had been. It was custom to march what we had learned of our show for them. This year had been wonderful. I could feel all the eyes on me, watching my every movement, and couldn't have been more excited. All I kept telling myself was that once it was all learned, once we were at our first competition, there would be ten times as many eyes on me, and I would prove to every single one of them what I could do. For the last hour, my mind had, once again, been absorbed into solely the music.

Now though, I was going to let loose. Everyone did on the last night at the dance. All the bandies surrounded by other bandies, moving fluidly to too-loud generic music and cheesy disco lights. It was simple and it was not much, but it we all loved it and enjoyed every moment of it. I was almost out the door when a voice called my name.

"Katie! Katie, come here, come here!" it was the overjoyed schoolgirl squeal of Alexa.

A little annoyed, I used her full name, but knew she wouldn't get the hint. "Alexandra, I'm trying to get to the dance _on time_, you know. What do you want?" She pointed to the hair curler and I pretended to almost fain, mimicking a fall to an over-exaggerated (and yet appropriate) groan as she pointed toward her hair curler.

Ten long, painful minutes later, I walked out of the dorms with particularly bouncy hair. I felt ridiculous, but Alexa seemed to be pleased with herself. I gazed at the sliver of sun that remained and the pink-streaked sky, took one last breath, and walked into the double doors of the cafeteria.

Immediately I slipped into the crowd, easily I fit into the familiar red and green and blue lights. I swayed and moved with the music, as everyone did. The generic beat was pulsing through the body of bandie now, and leave it to the bandies to move perfectly in time. This was something I enjoyed, and, for the first time this week, I felt like I wasn't wasting my last trip to band camp.

Soon, a quicker song came on, and I could feel unfamiliar hands on my waist their owner behind me. I kept dancing – it was band camp, anything went – and I could feel someone's face in my hair, and a body grow closer to mine as the hands pulled me closer. This was getting a little _too_ much, even for band camp. I fluidly slid my hands over someone's strong, warm arms and turned around quickly to face them. I stopped moving while everyone around me kept dancing. My hands fell off of his arms and dropped to my sides. I turned to walk outside. Jake slid his arm around my waist as he walked me out.

"What do you think you were doing?" I asked vehemently.

"Did you not dance with me? You didn't seem to be having such a horrible time..." he had a playfully crooked smile and look up at me through his sandy-colored hair.

"You shouldn't have ..." I stopped. I didn't really know why I felt so badly, why I was so angry with him.

"Why not? What do you think is so wrong with me?" he asked running his hands quickly through his tousled hair. "I _really_ like you Katie."

I could feel my face burning. Was I angry? Why did he have to go and say that? At first I was agitated, my thoughts were racing; then, I realized that I like him too. What had made me so upset was the gravity he seemed to have. I decided that, right now, Drum Major Katherine would just be Katie.

He was looking down at me know through his hair, emerald eyes burning into own light blue eyes. My eyes quickly flashed to his lips, and I could feel my heart beat a bit faster. He put his hand under my chin and pulled him face up to his gently. He turned his head slightly, and I mine accordingly. My eyes fluttered, then closed. Our lips met and I could feel the heat being transferred between us. This was what I had been waiting for, I now knew, this was the familiar emotion that I had recognized. He pulled back and my eyes locked onto his. He played with my curled hair with one hand and laughed quietly, his other arm pulling me up to him. Then he grazed his lips over mine, back and forth slowly and my lips felt like they were on fire with a terribly pleasant tingling sensation. Finally, when I could stand the teasing no longer, my fingers wrapped around the back of his neck, feeling his soft hair. I pressed my lips against his now a little more forcefully. All I could hear was our breathing, and my mind was sick with pleasure. I couldn't hear the music any longer, and I could not enjoy starry night, but I _did_ enjoy this quite a bit. My band camp finally had some excitement in it.

The next morning, I boarded the bus, taking once last glance at the camp that I would never see again. I looked around, recalling no memories except for last night. I did not mind this. Band camp was over, once and for all, and I left, hand in hand with Jake, with no regrets and with something I would never forget.


End file.
